1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to a method for automated placement of articles onto a support.
2. Description of the Related Art
Articles are usually offered in packages to the consumer wherein the packages can contain articles of the same or different kind. For example, in the food industry, packages of baked goods with identical or different types of baked goods or sweets are offered, for example, chocolate mixtures or the like. The placement of the identical or different articles into the packages is usually carried out by hand. Robots have already been proposed for taking over this type of manual labor.
When robots are used for placing identical or different articles on supports, a high efficiency must be achieved for obtaining shortest possible cycle times.
It is an object of the present invention to provide a method for automated placement of articles onto a support, which ensures a high placement efficiency while providing a gentle handling of the articles with minimal machine requirements.
In accordance with the present invention, this is achieved in that the support and the articles are positioned on a supply belt and are supplied to a detection device whose output signals are transmitted as measured data to a control unit. The control unit, based on the measured data, recognizes and differentiates the articles as well as the supports, wherein the control unit, after detection and differentiation of the articles and of the support, controls, based on predetermined criteria, a gripping device connected to the control unit, and carries out a placement step.
Initially, the articles to be packaged of the same or different kind are placed together with the support, for example, a package, a tray, a pizza crust, a cake crust or the like, onto a supply belt, wherein for carrying out the method the arrangement on the supply belt can be ordered, partially ordered or random. For example, the random arrangement of the articles and of the supports on the supply belt is detected by a detection device whose output signals are transmitted as measured data to a control unit. The control unit recognizes, based on the detection data (measured data), the articles as well as the supports, differentiates them, and, after recognition and differentiation of the articles, places the articles according to predetermined criteria onto the support by means of a gripping device connected to the control unit.
According to a special embodiment of the invention, the control unit, before carrying out a placement step by the gripping device, will start an internal simulation with which the placement step of an article onto the support is carried out virtually by the gripping device connected to the control unit. The performed simulations are evaluated and, based on predetermined or set criteria, one of the simulations is selected as a suitable one for an optimal placement step. Subsequently, the gripping device connected to the control unit is controlled in accordance with the selected simulation in order to grip the article which is positioned in a certain position and to place it quickly but gently onto the support in a way suitable for the external conditions.
When several gripping devices are connected to the control unit, it is also determined by means of simulations which individual one of the gripping devices arranged sequentially in the moving direction of the supply belt is suitable for the desired placement step.
The simulation can be realized in a simple way as a boolean operation. Preferably, the simulation is carried out according to a suitable algorithm so that not only product-specific parameters and/or construction-related parameters of the gripping device are included in the simulation but, preferably, also position-dependent and/or movement-dependent parameters of the gripping device are taken into account. For this purpose, the control unit is provided expediently as a computer with a corresponding high performance microprocessor. For creating a data base (data knowledge), it is also possible to employ neuronal and/or fuzzy-logic operations.
A precise detection of the articles and also of the supports is ensured in particular when the control unit detects and differentiates the articles based on a comparison of the measured data with saved article-specific basic data. For example, a plurality of shapes and patterns can be saved by the computer as a data pool in a data storage device (memory). In this way, the device is suitable, without requiring complex retrofitting actions, for a plurality of different types of articles and supports. It can be used for placement of sweets, such as chocolates or cookies, into packages as well as for combining articles to assortments, for example, in the case of screws or plugs (anchors) or for topping pizza crusts, cake or pie crusts, sandwiches, hamburgers or the like.